


eyes as clear as centuries

by stars_inthe_sky



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015), Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Desert, Environment, Forests, Gen, Plants, Rain, Water
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-26
Updated: 2016-05-26
Packaged: 2018-07-10 09:38:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,315
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6978103
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stars_inthe_sky/pseuds/stars_inthe_sky
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I didn’t know there was this much green in the whole galaxy,” she whispers in awe, and Han hasn’t forgotten the vicarious feeling of seeing trees for the first time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	eyes as clear as centuries

Han’s only thought when Leia directs them to Yavin 4 is disbelief—both that this woman who just withstood torture on the matter reveals her army’s base so readily to him, and that she’s taking them there despite her own admission that the Empire had probably let them leave the Death Star intentionally.

At some point, in the midst of their inevitable bickering, Chewie puts the Falcon into landing sequence, punching in the coordinates and access codes Leia and R2-D2 had provided. Han barely notices, and Leia is too busy berating him to bother acknowledging when they break atmo.

But, in between “I got no love for the Empire, Your Worship, but I came to get paid,” and “Then I expect you’ll be off planet before sundown, if this wreck can even hold together that long,” they’re interrupted by a small gasp coming from the cockpit.

The ship is holding together fine, thank you, but Han takes a few steps inside to check on things anyway. The Princess follows, not quite far enough behind him for comfort. But instead of impending disaster, all they find is Chewie, calming steering them toward the base, and Luke, whose face is so close to the window that his breath fogs up the glass.

Han had just begun respecting the kid enough to stop calling him “kid,” but right now Luke looks as innocent and untested as he had at Mos Eisley. In all fairness, Leia is probably roughly the same age, but he’s confident she’s never looked so unguarded or awed or _young_ in her entire life.

“I didn’t know there was this much green in the whole galaxy,” he murmurs, mostly to himself. The Falcon skims treetops for several minutes, and the vista’s nothing out of the ordinary, really, but Luke doesn’t move. It’s possible he doesn’t even blink.

Han hasn’t been to Yavin 4 before, but it doesn’t look so different from Corellia at a glance. If you’ve only ever seen the endless waste of space that is Tatooine, though, with a brief pit stop on an Imperial space station, the glint of the setting sun off the jungle must be near-blinding. Or a revelation.

Leia is staring at Luke, too, and she seems to be coming to the same realization. For a moment, the whole universe falls away, the Rebellion and Kenobi and the rest of it, and they both just watch this boy from the desert drinking in a rainforest.

The Falcon shudders to a stop on the Rebels’ landing pad, and Han wraps a friendly arm around Luke’s neck to tug him onto the new world. “There’s a whole universe of color out there, kid. You’ll see.”

***

Being back in the cockpit of the Falcon feels as natural as anything, and the girl’s got his ship flying better than it has in years. Han barely thinks about punching in the coordinates for Maz’s place or setting the landing sequence as his well-worn chair embraces him and the familiar filtered air streams into the quiet calm of the cockpit. It’s been too long, yet he feels thirty years younger at the same time.

His homecoming is overridden, though, by the understanding that he’s once again dealing with an astromech droid whose innards have to get to Leia. There’s no telling if this lead has any legitimacy; after so many years since Luke vanished like smoke, those closest to him have chased down more than enough dead ends to think this will probably be one more.

But of course Han’s going to make sure Leia has every chance of finding Luke that he can give her. He’s never quite been able to deny her, or her brother, and something about the determination in this new girl’s eyes makes him say yes, too.

Maz will know where to point them, at least, and the droid seems to have a good sense of where to find the Resistance anyway. Both of the kids seem like the type to be elbows-deep in the cause before realizing they’ve started, and Han would know. Certainly its leader has a demonstrated soft spot for talented orphans from the desert and bad boys trying to make good, if the other kid really is an escaped Stormtrooper like his boots and body language suggest.

And even if these kids don’t seem to mind his reclaiming his ship from them, he’s not going to dump them on Takodana, no matter what his baser instincts suggest. Whatever heartless streak he’d attempted to cultivate in his own rascally youth has long since been berated out of him by the only person he’d ever really taken orders from.

A sharp intake of breath interrupts his thoughts, and he glances to his right, where the girl is settled in the copilot’s chair. She isn’t paying attention to the controls, though, or even to the anxious kid behind her; instead, she’s gazing forward at the bright emerald landscape and its clear blue interruptions.

“I didn’t know there was this much green in the whole galaxy,” she whispers in awe, and Han hasn’t forgotten the vicarious feeling of seeing trees for the first time.

Knowing what happened to the last strays he and Chewie had picked up in this ship, Han isn’t sure whether he should promise her a rainbow of worlds just now, but he’s got a feeling she’ll manage to see it all anyway.

***

Rey dances atop the Millennium Falcon, undeterred by the light rain soaking through her clothing. “Does this ever get old?”

Luke climbs up to join her, closing the hatch behind him to shield an already wet Chewbacca from further assault. “I don’t think so. It certainly hasn’t yet.”

She stares up at the rolling clouds, grinning. He can’t help returning the smile. “I used to dream about this, or a place like it. So much water…and so many colors!”

“Deserts have color, after a while,” Luke points out, but he knows that isn’t what she meant. He’s never been back to Tatooine, nor met someone else who understands how sand, like darkness or water or forests, isn’t just any one color. But it’s not enough, not if you can’t stop looking at the stars and wondering. “Hardly the same, though.”

“Trees may be my favorite, still,” Rey admits. “I don’t think I could get tired of looking at all that green, not even for more water.”

Luke closes his eyes, remembering for a moment the feeling of stepping out of the Falcon onto the forest floor near Yavin’s base, air thick with humidity and mud running underneath his boots. It’s fitting, somehow, that this ship had carried both of them away from the dunes and the dryness of their childhoods, that they could both find themselves surrounded by life and elements beyond endless sand and its rough inhabitants.

Rey stops staring at the layered gray sky long enough to clamber over the hull and settle down next to Luke. Knees tucked under her chin, she wraps her arms around her legs and gazes up again, then back at him. “He missed you, I think.”

“I don’t imagine he would’ve said as much,” Luke chuckles. “But thank you. I missed him as well.”

“It seemed like he understood,” she adds after a pause. “About the—all the green, you know?”

He nods. “We talked about that, a long time ago. And then we went and saw a whole rainbow of worlds. When the rain stops, you should start.” He rests a hand on her shoulder for a moment, then rises to open the hatch again.

She follows him back into the cockpit, but not before she corrects him. “ _We_ should start.” He can take his time about it if he needs to, but she has promises to keep.

“Fair enough,” Luke says. “We’ve already got the ship for it. Let’s go see a galaxy.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> Story title is from Paul Simon's "[Born at the Right Time](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ypNNxuPnSw)."
> 
> May the Force be with [Red](archiveofourown.org/users/red_b_rackham) and [Hana](http://archiveofourown.org/users/c00kie), proofreaders extraordinaire. 
> 
> Sparked by [this post](http://stars-inthe-sky.tumblr.com/post/143346793706) of [reyamidala](http://reyamidala.tumblr.com/post/141513241258)'s on Tumblr and [fanart of Rey in the rain](http://shorelle.tumblr.com/post/137466779565/here-we-are-now-with-the-falling-sky-and-the-rain) by [shorelle](http://shorelle.tumblr.com/).


End file.
